|
Description: |
The Beach School program rests on the cornerstones of self-initiated learning, democratic governance, trust, age-mixing, and community.
Self-Initiated Learning: During the day students decide how they would like to spend their time at the school. The staff serve as role models and resources. Students determine their own activities, set their own goals, set their own schedules, and evaluate their own progress in any way they choose. This teaches skills in areas such as self-motivation, self-evaluation, goal-setting, creativity, time-management, persistence, resourcefulness, and in some situations, leadership. Students at The Beach School learn particular skills and information related to their own interests, but most importantly learn how to learn in their own unique style. The philosophy of the school is that self-initiated learning produces the most meaningful and lasting results for students.
Democratic Governance: The Beach school is run democratically through the weekly School Meeting where students and staff each have one vote and participate in everything from rule-making, policy-setting, discipline, budgeting, to even appointments to administrative positions and staff hiring. This teaches skills in areas such as communication, organization, decision-making, ethics, public speaking, and financial management.
Trust: Students at the school are trusted to make meaningful decisions about their learning and the running of their school. The school believes that children learn to handle the responsibilities of adult life by being given responsibility at a young age.
Age-mixing: The Beach School accepts students aged 4-19. Students are not separated into grades or classes, but rather interact as a whole community. This allows students to acquire the skills outlined above within a community of people from various backgrounds and at various stages in life. The Beach School's philosophy is that age-mixing enhances opportunities for teaching and learning both subject-specific skills and life skills such as communication and tolerance.
Community: Participation in the community of the school itself provides many opportunities for learning subject-specific and interpersonal skills. The larger community of Toronto also provides opportunities for learning in diverse areas, which are accessible to students through school resource lists and internship programs.
|